Ruby and Rata

1990 New Zealand film
  • 4 October 1990 (1990-10-04) (New Zealand)
Running time
109 minutesCountryNew ZealandLanguageEnglishBudgetNZD $2 millionBox officeNZD $355,000 (New Zealand)[1]

Ruby and Rata is a 1990 New Zealand comedy-drama film, directed and produced by Gaylene Preston.[2]

Plot summary

Ruby (Yvonne Lawley) is an 83-year-old woman who has just failed her driving test and is worried about her ability to cope with day-to-day life at her age. She asks her nephew Buckle (Simon Barnett), posing as a real estate agent, to arrange to lease part of the house she owns to a potential housemate to assist her with various chores. The new tenant is Rata (Vanessa Rare)—a well-dressed, smooth-talking young woman of Māori descent who works for a large finance company. Once she has moved in, it becomes apparent that Rata is actually a cleaner at the firm, has a young son named Willie (Lee Metekingi), and is in trouble with social services over welfare payments. Rata is also hoping to make it big as a singer in a punk band, The Apocalypse, which is reliant on her accessing the supposed "fortune" of her new housemate/landlady to pay for sound equipment. An unusual relationship develops between Ruby, Rata and Willie, with each of them manipulating the others in some way, but forming a bond and dependence on each other.[2][3]

Cast

  • Yvonne Lawley – Ruby
  • Vanessa Rare – Rata
  • Lee Metekingi – Willie
  • Simon Barnett – Buckle

Production

Ruby and Rata was filmed in and around the Auckland suburb of Mount Albert.[4]

It was the second film made by Preston-Laing Productions (Gaylene Preston and Robin Laing), the first being the 1986 horror film Mr Wrong.[5]

Awards

Ruby and Rata won four awards at the 1990 NZ Film Awards: Best Editing, Best Soundtrack, Best Film Score and Best Performance (Male).[3]

References

  1. ^ "Top Fourteeen New Zealand Movies Released in New Zealand". (issuu pp. 61,64). No. 97–98. Cinema Papers New Zealand supplement. April 1994. pp. 15, 18. Retrieved 7 August 2022.
  2. ^ a b "Ruby and Rata". British Film Institute. 1990. Archived from the original on 27 January 2023. Retrieved 27 January 2023.
  3. ^ a b "Ruby and Rata". NZ On Screen. Retrieved 30 October 2014.
  4. ^ Edwards, Helen; Martin, Sam (1997). New Zealand film : 1912–1996 (1. publ. ed.). Auckland [u.a.]: Oxford Univ. Press. ISBN 0195583361.
  5. ^ Vieth, Albert; Moran, Errol (2009). The A to Z of Australian and New Zealand cinema. Lanham: Scarecrow Press. ISBN 978-0810863477.
  • Ruby and Rata at IMDb
  • Ruby and Rata at NZ On Screen
  • v
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Films directed by Gaylene Preston
Features
  • All The Way Up There (1979)
  • Making Utu (1982)
  • Mr Wrong (1985)
  • Kai Pūrākau - The Storyteller (1987)
  • Ruby and Rata (1990)
  • Married (1992)
  • Bread and Roses (1993)
  • War Stories Our Mothers Never Told Us (1995)
  • Hone Tūwhare (1996)
  • Getting to Our Place (1999)
  • Titless Wonders (2001)
  • Perfect Strangers (2003)
  • Earthquake! (2006)
  • The Time of Our Lives (2007)
  • Lovely Rita (2007)
  • Home by Christmas (2010)
  • Hope and Wire (Full Series) (2014)
  • My Year with Helen (2017)
Shorts
  • Hold Up (1981)
  • The Only One You Need - The Neighbours Compilation (1982)
  • Nuclear Horror Show Parade (1983)
  • Saving the Earth (1984)
  • Mindout (1984)
  • Last Days at McVay Street (1988)
  • Survivor Stories (1998)
  • Wahine Requiem (2001)
  • The Making of Perfect Strangers (2004)
  • Strongman - The Tragedy (2012)
  • The Waterside (2014)
  • Hot Words and Bold Retorts (2018)


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